


Sweet Deadly Summer Wine

by Kuro_Ko



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vikings, Angst with a Happy Ending, Comfort/Angst, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:22:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25514236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kuro_Ko/pseuds/Kuro_Ko
Summary: Ingrid is a fearsome warrior from the far off north, where the wind and the snow sing the language of her gods. Dorothea is a summer maiden, engulfed in mystery and power granted by those who were born with it. They come from different cultures, different countries, different languages, different stories.Yet, they manage to find themselves regardless.Viking AU.
Relationships: Dorothea Arnault & Ingrid Brandl Galatea, Dorothea Arnault/Ingrid Brandl Galatea, Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Comments: 11
Kudos: 45





	1. Warm winds from a foreign land

The wind, cold and sharp as the edge of her lance back at home, was warm in those foreign lands. Their heavy capes and furs had been left behind, at the bottom of their boats alongside their meager provisions and their mercy.

She'd find later that a small part of that mercy still lived in her, however.

Felix was sharpening his sword, the cold, grey screech was the music that filled their days and the song that carried the wind in their sails. On the horizon, they saw the coast, houses, and little fishing boats with people in them.

Dimitri was looking at them with his only eye, a moonstruck grin plastered in his face like a mask.

"We're here, lads."

“What do you wanna do, Boar?”

Ingrid looked at the coast, the rolling hills with harvest fields, and tried to make out some of the people that walked in the distance to no avail. She clicked her tongue, as Dimitri walked past her and put a foot over the bow, focusing his sight on them. Behind them more drakkars were coming, it was the first town they’d seen in weeks of sailing.

They were hungry, as the winter wind and the white snow that ravished the land gulping away anything that wasn’t strong enough as to endure it.

Felix got to his feet, sheathing his sword and crossing his arms. There was a displeased grimace in his face when he asked again “Boar, what do you want to do?”

Dimitri looked at him, his blue eye had an intelligent gloss that could be terrifying when he was pondering their options, his black armor still under the sun.

“We’ll make them meet the gods today.” He said, his sight fixed in the town that got bigger as their boats cut the waves toward the shore.

Ingrid looked at the coast again, this time the grip in her lance a strong one. Even from the distance, she could hear the clear and frenetic ring of a bell, calling out the danger that loomed over them, the north curse that would feast upon them till they were immortalized in songs and stories as demons.

Till history was twisted and changed and their weapons would be described as the scourge of god and their faces the demons that had crawled their way from hell itself.

Sylvain stood next to her, a hand in her shoulder and an easy smile in his lips.

The truth was somewhat simpler.

They were humans and, like humans, their nature was a complex one, shared among all nations and cultures alike.

“Gear up! We’re drinking wine today, lads!”

* * *

Ingrid moved quickly, from house to house, dispatching foes poorly prepared and poorly trained. The villagers that had stayed and fought were no match to the trained warriors under Dimitri’s banner. She had been quick and deadly, cutting her path alongside Felix and Sylvain as a trained unit, a single mind that never doubted when taking an enemy down.

And yet they had split, running thin as the town extended beyond what they'd thought at first from their drakkars, when they rammed through it, ravaging and cleaning any armed resistance.

Ingrid had found herself alone, kicking doors open and going through houses lighting fast. Grabbing objects that could be valuable and making sure she didn’t miss anybody who could be a threat.

The cries of the battlefield that had turned into a slaughter were behind her now, her armor heavy in her legs and shoulders, her weapons clattering as she jogged through deserted streets and dirt pathways. She had a small pouch she’d filled already with silver coins and ancient jewels somebody had left in their houses. They wouldn’t be that valuable if they had decided to let them behind, right? Ingrid did know the answer to it, but she preferred to ignore it, there were things that demanded her attention more than the crying owner of a family jewel or a merchant that hadn’t taken their coin purse with them. Something as the muffled cries she heard from a house.

She stopped in her tracks, her senses sharpening, her frame straightening up. She was right, a small, almost inaudible cry came from one of the houses. Ingrid bit her lips and looked around. Her friends weren’t around, neither the men that fought under other banners. She was alone, and a child was crying inside the house. Her gut churned, her face crossed by a shadow, a somber omen. There was a decision to be made, a decision she had to make.

She sighed into her hands and blinked, taking the weight of her determination with the weight of her armor and the lance and shield in her hands. She set the lance against the wall outside the house, making sure her dagger was close and easy to unsheathe and use if she had to resource to it, before opening the door slowly, letting her eyes adjust the change in light, breathing in the smell of a home that wasn’t hers, of spices and people she didn’t know.

The deafening silence that seemed now enhanced by her presence in the threshold of that door, her silhouette a black figure against the furniture and the dirt floor. 

Ingrid swallowed and made her way in, step by step, her shield ready and her eyes wide, taken in all of her surroundings. Her heart throbbing and the Mjölnir in her chest hot. She put a foot in front of the other and she thought no more, every movement was driven by instinct and practice, her skin picking up any change in the air, a single breeze an electrical wave sending information to her brain that acted on its own.

It seemed like a normal house, like the ones she had already pillaged, the same shadows, similar furniture, almost the same disposition.

Yet something was off.

Something was amiss.

She breathed in, the low, low cry came from her right. She looked there briefly, before checking her surroundings again. Ingrid was alone, or alone with that kid in that house.

Her mouth was a displeased line, yet she moved toward the noise, her feet silent, her knees buckling, her body a spring coiled ready to jump.

She heard it first rather than saw it. Her jump backward was precise as she raised her shield, deflecting the blade that was looking to slit her throat. Ingrid shifted her feet and widened her stance, her right hand with her dagger in hand already, a deadly gleam in the darkness of the house.

She blinked.

Before her, out of thin air, a woman in a burgundy dress looked at her, a butchering knife in hand. Ingrid blinked again. Her eyes were green and electrical, green as the forests that guarded her home back in the fjords, the tall trees that acted as sentries of the path to her parent’s house, her childhood house, a place where some of her happiest memories lived.

The woman charged again, and Ingrid sheathed her dagger and deflected the blow with ease. The knife would never be a match for her shield, not even in the hands of an expert, much less in the hands of a woman that wielded it as a two-handed sword. Her green eyes had strength, a furious look that would put fear into an enemy’s heart if she were to wear armor and wield a real weapon. She positioned herself strategically again, Ingrid could see now the kids behind her, curled up in an embrace that mingled them in a tangle of limbs and tears that were difficult to tell apart.

In the sharp edge of the blade, Ingrid was reflected as the stranger she was to them, her face painted with strips of red from the battlefield where she had proven her worth, her green eyes cold stones, her wild hair tamed in complicated braids as none of the inhabitants of that land had seen before.

Ingrid straightened up, letting her stance drop just a bit, her necklace so heavy in her neck now.

“No, I don’t want to hurt you.” She said, shaking her head, taking a step back. The woman looked at her, her eyes filled with distrust and wary, not letting go of her blade, never stopping to point at her, a snarl in her lips. Ingrid backed away a bit more, lowering her shield completely. She was confident she could parry any blow she could attempt at her. “I’m not hurting or capturing a couple of kids, get away from here before they see you.” She motioned them outside, haste in every movement. She wasn’t sure how long they’d be alone, truly alone before the kids would be picked to be sold as slaves and the woman decided upon being a mistress for their joy or a neck for their swords.

Those green eyes looked at her second after second, until understanding appeared in them slowly and suspicious still. She lowered her blade and stretched her left hand behind her, calling the children that she hid, looking for comfort in her long dress and her slender frame.

“Go!” Ingrid hurried them again, motioning the door. She was given one final look, green eyes, brunette locks, a fair white skin, before a nod of understanding, and words she couldn’t understand were granted to her. The voice was somewhat flowery and silky despite the rough tone she used. She grabbed the kids by their hands and rushed out the house, stopping just in the doorframe to make sure the street was clear, before breaking into a sprint.

Ingrid stayed in the house a couple of seconds more, her thoughts reeling back to a normal pace, her heart hammering against her chest and her mouth dry. She walked outside, grabbing her lance and looking toward the direction the kids and the women had escaped. She let her shield on the ground and grabbed her necklace.

For a second, Ingrid regretted not to talk that language, she’d like to know the name of a woman capable of standing her ground against a warrior armed only with a dress and a butchering knife. She let the afternoon wind play with her hair a second longer, before sighing and grabbing her weapons, walking toward the shore and her kind.

There wasn’t anything else she could do for them. That little piece of mercy she had carried unknowingly spared in those three figures that had disappeared through the houses toward the main road.

She’d learn later that she had been wrong, there were still things she could do for them.

For her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's time for Dorogrid, lads! This was my pitch to convince myself of writing this:
> 
> Ingrid as a Viking, Dorothea as a French lady.
> 
> Done.
> 
> This is the first of a 3 chapters story. The ones that are to come are longer, I should update in about two or three days as these are mostly written already.


	2. Yggdrasil, the connector of worlds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Dorothea.” The woman repeated, slow, her tongue flickering through words and sounds Ingrid had never heard before. “Dorothea.” She heard again from the flow of words she couldn’t tell apart.
> 
> “Dorothea.” She smiled, liking how it settled in her own tongue. “Dorothea.”

Ingrid scouted the strange land under the morning light, a blinding headache behind her eyes threatening to make her bow and throw up from the saddle. They had drunk wine all right, as Dimitri had promised, and she had forgotten her worries and her doubts in the warm, dark liquid that was so easy to come by in these lands. It’s taste settled heavily in her tongue, heavier than the usual mead she tended to drink. She liked it and had allowed for once Sylvain to fill her mug maybe too many times in the night, till the world had lost its shape and things their limits and she was turning without moving and laughing without coaxing.

And then she had slept, a dreamless slumber, heavy and short, before being shaken by Felix, telling her it was their time to go scouting.

She tilted forward in the saddle, a mare they had found yesterday in the stables her mount, her stomach fighting its own battles. The brown fur of her mount was splattered by mud in its neck, belly, and legs, the animal took long strides as she walked through the muddy bed of a river that was running thin in the scorching sun of summer. Her shield was heavy in her back, covered by a rough leather to hide the shining metal that kept the wood together, she had left her lance behind, replacing it by a sword and a bow she had taken from Felix and Ashe. She didn’t like fighting mounted on a horse she didn’t know with her trusted lance.

She didn’t want to stand out that much either.

Yet it wasn’t an easy feat, her blond locks braided in intricate patterns, her green and gray clothes and the scattered light armor she was wearing gave her away easily under the morning light. The mare took an even longer step, as they crossed the river, making her stomach churned. Ingrid bowed this time, throwing up in the river the meager content of her stomach, a light breakfast she barely had finished.

Groaning she cleaned her mouth and grabbed her water pouch, gulping the liquid down and rinsing her mouth. She’d good to remember how a hangover felt like the next time she let Sylvain fill her mug.

The river under them kept running, the water never the same, flowing in an endless cycle she didn’t understand but appreciated somewhat. In the blue sky over her, the clouds rolled lazily, barely a promise of shade, not a single trace of rain. Ingrid spurred the mare and kept her sword close and her water pouch even closer.

Squinting, the river, a bright streak in her eyes that worsened her headache, she examined the horizon looking for a trace of danger, a sign of people that they couldn’t overcome as easily as the villagers they had come across the day before. The green hills, now just covered by forests from time to time, the soft slopes almost an invitation to fall asleep in their laps. Ingrid frowned and kept her route, she would return soon, no army or armed group would be close enough as to get them unprepared. She patted the strong neck of the mare, who had been docile and willing, before taking one last look and sighing, turning the reins to go back to her friends and comrades.

And she saw it.

It was the same color the woman had been using the day before.

Ingrid remained static for a second, taken away by the surprise for a moment, her right hand that rested until that moment in the pommel of her sword, traveled to her chest and grabbed her necklace. Her honed senses now seeing all the signs she had missed after picking up the burgundy that tried to keep hidden.

She could leave, letting her go once more as she had done before. She could come closer and try to talk to her, which was ridiculous since neither of them shared a language that could say something meaningful to them.

She could also stop with her indecisive nature and get it over with, the woman was a loose end, a danger that she should’ve taken care of before.

Ingrid dismounted in a hop, the water in her boots barely a nuisance, warm compared to the cold rivers and lakes back at home. Hooking her shield off her shoulders and guiding the mare by the reins, she walked toward her, following the same path the woman had followed. She saw the small steps, faded away already, she saw the trees nearby that seemed like a safe haven to look for shelter after a long run. She saw her intentions displayed beyond her as clear as the sun over her.

It was a stupid idea, and yet Ingrid didn’t let her strides waver.

She’d deal with the consequences later.

Overall, she wanted to see the green eyes as the sentries that guarded her home so far away and long ago.

Her body crouched by instinct, as she got closer to her prey, her knees bent and her hand instead of an arrow or her dagger kept her shield close, she was closing in the distance and yet keeping her guard up. Just a couple of steps more and she’d be among that small patch of trees, a sort of forest too young to call itself such.

Just a little more.

And the green she thought she had imagined looked at her from cold, calculating eyes.

Ingrid couldn’t help but smile. She was doing something very stupid and very dangerous.

Good.

Ingrid Brand Galatea wasn’t a coward and she’d show it to the world once more.

“Hey…” She called, lowering the shield and looking around. The kids weren’t there, which didn’t say much to her, but it did give her a sense of privacy, of solitude. In her hands, the woman still had the same knife she had wielded against her before.

Ingrid smiled.

At least one of them wasn’t a complete idiot.

She let go of her shield and sat on top of it, crossing her legs and eyeing her, curiosity filling with intent each of her actions. The mare waited patiently next to her, unimpressed by the second human that appeared, she snorted and sniffed the ground looking for something edible to get her through the morning easier.

The woman, she could now look at her at pleasure, watched her one more time and lowered the blade, never letting go of it.

“Hey.” Ingrid repeated, looking in her food pouch the fruit pieces she had thought she could need in her scouting trip. Turned out she would need them for something a little different.

The woman had rich, brown locks that cascaded free through her shoulders and back, there was something soft in her features despite the hostility she could feel from her. Her nose was straight and proud, her profile strong and yet feminine. 

Her eyes the same green she thought impossible to find in another person.

Ingrid fumbled with her right hand until she made appear a couple of apples from the pouch. She bit one, a considerable chunk of the red and juicy apple in her teeth now, and extended the other one to the woman.

She was tired, there were dark bags under her eyes and her expression was wary and weary all together. Ingrid could recognize fatigue when she saw it, she knew that she must’ve run since their encounter the day before, trying to put distance between her and the foreigners that had just raided the coast, to now be in front one of them being offered an apple.

It was a bad spot to be on. Yet she reached out and took the fruit with slow, calculated movements.

Ingrid smiled, a common language for all of them, and grabbed the apple she kept in her mouth to tear the white meat and swallow the sweet fruit despite her stomach acting up on her.

“It’s good, I hope I can keep it down.” She said casually, grabbing another bite and looking at her. She chewed this time, her elbows resting on top of her knees, the mare trying to grab a bite of the apple in her hand. The image was ridiculous, she knew.

And it worked.

Despite her efforts, a smile blossomed in the woman’s lips, who took a small bite from the apple, still clenching her knife, still wary of her.

But eating across her a shared meal nonetheless.

Ingrid pushed the mare by her snout, laughing a bit as the animal tried one last time before neighing softly and getting back to sniffing the earth around them. She looked at the woman, who was well into her third bite and examined her again. She could’ve made it further from them, she thought, if she had wanted.

Had she stayed behind for the kids?

Were there more towns around she would try to reach?

Why was she so fixed in letting her go?

Ingrid just knew the answer to one question, yet she refused to acknowledge it to herself.

“Ingrid.” She said, after swallowing the last of her bite and throwing the heart of the apple to the mare. “My name is Ingrid.”

The woman raised an eyebrow, and then the second one, it was a lovely expression for her frame, her shoulders bare and her neck long. She cleared her throat and sighed, maybe regretting what she was about to do, yet still going through it.

Ingrid understood, she knew how it felt to do something she would regret and keep moving forward despite the knowledge sitting heavy at the back of her mind.

A flow of words and sounds bathed her, leaving her puzzled and tingling, blinking away her perplexed feelings and tilting forward, her face a question that the other one could repeat. The woman laughed, it was a melodic sound if she could say so herself, and straightened up, ready to enunciate her name again as if it was the most important piece of information she could give her.

In a way it was.

In a way, it was the only piece of information she could grant Ingrid.

“Dorothea.” The woman repeated, slow, her tongue flickering through words and sounds Ingrid had never heard before. “Dorothea.” She heard again from the flow of words she couldn’t tell apart.

“Dorothea.” She smiled, liking how it settled in her own tongue. “Dorothea.”

* * *

“What is it, Ingrid? Still hungover?” Sylvain was charming, as usual, his dark clothes creased after a night sleeping on the ground, drunk and wasted.

“Shut up, I should’ve known better than letting you decide how much I was drinking.” Ingrid slided off her saddle with a grunt, falling heavily on her feet, patting her pants and her face, tired and aching. 

“Ingrid, you’re back before Felix.” Dimitri was there, imposing, a tower of a man that even Sylvain had to look up to. “Did you see anything?”

A green so beautiful that it had to be a dream, but that it wasn’t.

“No, all clear. There’s a river toward the east, about half an hour or so on horse.” She pointed toward the blinding water that had made her headache worse. “Patches of forest, nothing serious. I didn’t see other villages.” She finished her report, looking at him waiting for his orders, awaiting the man that pointed his sword toward new lands and she followed willingly, the man she had accompanied for years, years she had collected her part and had looked after her siblings back at home.

She was, in a way, finally free, after her siblings were able to look for themselves and needed her no more.

“Good, thank you.” He nodded, before making his way away. Ingrid looked at him, stretching her shoulders and listening to her bones pop and crack as her posture changed. Sylvain grabbed her by her shoulders, ruffling her hair. She sighed again, hiding her face with her right hand.

She had lied to the man she had sworn to follow.

She had lied to him for a couple of emerald, beautiful eyes.

Ingrid was in deep shit, she knew and she failed to care as she should’ve.

* * *

She saw Dorothea again a couple of days later. She was sure of it, yet Ingrid just caught a glimpse of her before she disappeared into the fields she had been scouting. It mesmerized her how the woman could simply disappear like that. It also frustrated her. Ingrid had stopped the mare and made her circle on herself, looking around for Dorothea at not avail.

Biting her lips in a displeasure frown, she spurred the mare to keep walking.

Her eyes kept up, looking for the elusive woman that seemed to play at the edge of her vision, a ghost that faded as soon as she turned when she thought she had seen her silhouette playing with the light of another bright, summer day. A cruel mirage that had taken hold of her mind, rooted in her memories, in her imagination.

In the sweet and misleading depiction of Dorothea in her thoughts, runaway horses that would never stop thundering through her.

* * *

The next time they found armed resistance, it was a small yet well-armed group of soldiers. They moved like a unit and followed orders from their superior.

They were, at best, a good training opponent that fell to their weapons as they tore them apart. Ingrid fought, letting her drive consume her, bold and wild strikes from her lance opening a bloody path before her. Luin, in wide swings, cut flesh and leather alike, she felt each strike in her shoulders, her shield parrying the last weak strikes from a dying soldier that yell at her parting words she didn’t understand.

When they were finished, only the bodies of those who had grown in that land laid on the ground, a last, forced posture in death. They were quick looking for something of value from them, Ingrid took a silver locket from one of them, it was light and warm in her hands, a serious frown in her lips. It was worth something, she was sure.

It had been of more worth to the soldier she had just killed.

She put it in her poach and continued roaming through the battlefield. Piling up bodies and setting them on fire before Dimitri called for her. He was covered in dark blood, the blood of his enemies, and his electric, wild blue eyes had a clear mission for her.

“We need to make sure there aren’t more around, you’re the best scouter, Ingrid.” He said, pointing behind him at where they had let the horses, still too fresh and unknown to be used in battle. She nodded and hopped in the brown mare.

Ingrid spurred her and soon she was out of their sight, galloping through the green fields that seemed to dominate the coast of that foreign land. She was tired, the adrenaline running out and her wounds aching, her bones settling in the chill that followed every battle. Yet her hands were strong as she gripped the reins and marched forward, reining the mare enough to change the pace to a quick, springy trot. Her surroundings were silent, solitary birds in the sky crossed it lazily, and the small game ran as they heard the hooves hammering the earth.

She kept her task dutifully, paying no mind to the blood that trickled from her temple and the trembling in her knuckles as the blood that flew from her forearms got dry and made a crust over them.

A sudden tug of the reins made her mount stop at once.

Dorothea was there, looking at her with wide, shocked eyes. Looking at the blood in her face, the weapons in her back, the fierce countenance that dominated her features, the snarl that had taken a hold in her lip without her permission. The dangerous lust in her eyes.

Ingrid breathed in deep, the time around them stopped, her ears now picking up only the sound of her racing heart.

And she hoped down her mount, raising her hands to show she meant no harm, before slowly, very slowly, step by step, get closer to her. She covered a couple of meters, the mare trailing behind her, before calling her name tentatively.

“Dorothea.”

The woman blinked, and her expression was, somewhat, softer.

“Dorothea, what are you doing here?”

Dorothea shook her head, not understanding a word of it.

“Get the hell out of here, they’ve picked up our location, more reinforcements may come soon.” She dropped her hands, before, motioning her to leave. The throbbing of her heart in her chest was the natural sound of a watch that tickled down, of the time she couldn’t spend talking to this woman she had become obsessed about. The time she shouldn’t spend thinking about her late at night after the quietness had fallen over her people like a blanket and she still gazed at the stars letting her mind be away in fantasies that the gods would never indulge.

“Ingrid.” And her voice was melodic and beautiful, and she knew it could wound her more than any of the swords she had faced just an hour ago. “Ingrid.” She repeated.

And it was a charm. A spell she could use to root Ingrid to the ground and make her lower her guard and open her chest. A spell that made Ingrid forgot, for a second, where her loyalty should lay and where here people where.

The blonde clenched her jaw and shook her head strongly, gaining back some of her senses. “Look, I’m leaving, and so should you.” She said, backing away from the woman, green eyes examining her and picking her apart bit by bit.

Dorothea didn’t say anything else, but she touched her temple, the same spot where Ingrid was hurt. She mirrored her gesture, feeling the hot blood there and the sting of the wound being pressed.

It was enough to break the spell. Ingrid had been clenching her necklace without realizing, tightly gripped in her left hand. With a last look, she hopped on the mare again and spurred it away from Dorothea and her green, magnetic eyes.

* * *

The mist was heavy, covering the horizon and engulfing the earth as a thick, powerful cloak that faded objects and blurred shapes into a ghost of themselves. Yet Ingrid and Dorothea were sitting close enough as to touch each other, close enough to recognize each of their features and satisfy their curiosity. Dorothea was using a different dress, a deeper shade of burgundy, yet a beautiful contrast to her skin. Ingrid had found herself looking at it and wishing to touch the fabric to burn its feeling in her mind.

Yet it was Dorothea the one that seemed braver in that situation, examining Ingrid’s bracelet and describing it in her tongue she couldn’t make sense of. Ingrid looked at her with both her elbows in her knees, her right wrist felt naked without her silver bracelet. A gift from Dimitri after a fight she had been the point of the sword that had broken through enemies, a path for the rest to follow.

“It’s a gift.” She said, scratching her nose, the new scars in her forearms flashes of white as the muscles underneath popped with the little gesture. “From Dimitri, I have more, but that one is special.” Dorothea looked at her, nodding, before turning back her attention to the bracelet to trace all its little notches.

“A gift.” Her pronunciation was rough, her tongue too soft and wide in some consonants, but it was a start. A better start than Ingrid’s, that was for sure.

“Yes. A gift.” She looked through her haversack and extended her some cheese to share. “Here, a gift.” She repeated, her hand stretched enough for her to take the food, not enough as to touch her. Dorothea smiled and returned the bracelet, accepting the piece of cheese with a nod.

They ate in silence after that, the mist swallowing the world around them, hiding them under its heavy mantle.

The ocean, just a hundred meters away, rocked the viking’s drakkars gently.

* * *

“That wasn’t sloppy. I’m impressed.” Felix was wiping sweat from his brow, a rare yet pleased smile in his lips. Ingrid raised an eyebrow, her breath ragged after their last spar. “You usually follow your swings too much, it gives an opening every time. Not today.”

“Our beautiful Ingrid has finally gotten over her fixation over women, and, as you, my love, has decided to give her love to her weapon!” Sylvain was sitting on the ground just outside the square they had delimited as a training area. Both contenders looked at her with a silent threat, which he shrugged off easily.

“Shut up already. I just trained enough.” She looked at Felix, who was looking at her, she saw how his brown eyes lightened up for a second, understanding flooding them, an idea that sent a chill shiver through her spine. “Right, Felix?”

“I suppose. Maybe it’s because all the scouting you’ve been doing.” He pointed his sword at her, all his posture crying something she didn’t want to see. “Again.” He demanded, waiting for her to pick up her spear and start all over.

He knew.

He knew something was off, of course he knew, they’ve been friends, comrades, for many years.

Sylvain winked at her, his easy smile hiding the exact same secret that Felix’s eyes.

They both knew.

She swallowed and raised her lance.

She was so deep already, yet she refused to see it.

* * *

Dorothea was getting surprisingly good at speaking her language. She had picked up first isolated words, objects, and concepts easy to grasp and apply.

Then she had understood how to initiate questions, she had applied concepts complex and started to make full sentences, mistaken most of them, yes, but enough as to get her point across.

It had been a plus, of course, their strange, unnamed relationship had improved enormously just by sharing spare words and long stares. Ingrid didn’t expect it to backfire at her. At least not that fast.

Her fingers, usually strong and firm, always so sure when holding her spear, or her shield, or just her mug when she drank surrounded by her friends, trembled and fumbled as she separated Dorothea’s hair carefully, trying to think the silly little songs her mother used to sing her when she did her braids so many years ago. Those fond days were behind her now, her mother laid to rest a long time ago, yet she remembered her touch, the caress of her fingertips as she braided her long hair, singing and humming as the task was completed, a labor of love no mother could refuse.

Dorothea’s hair was wilder than hers, her strands never quite tamed, a personality that shone through even in the smallest of the brown and brunette’s strands that ran in her fingers as silk. Yet she tried, humming weakly, asking her mother to guide her hands as if this was her child who needed to be taken care of, once more.

“How you…” She had asked before, when they had sat under the cool shadow of a sturdy tree Ingrid didn’t know the name of. She had looked at her, tilting her head. “Your…” And Dorothea touched her hair, the same sport where she had her braids freshly tied and secured.

“My braids?” Ingrid touched them, part of her by now, after years of using them, different styles, different lengths, always braids that kept her blonde hair away.

“How you… braid?” Dorothea repeated, now untangling her own long hair with her soft fingers.

How had it developed in such a strange way? How was that now it was Ingrid the one braiding her hair? Dorothea had let herself go, her back against her stomach, her breathing deep and steady, a rhythm that belonged only to her, to her chest rising and falling as her green eyes remained hidden behind her eyelids. A treasure she knew was there but couldn’t reach. Her pink, defined lips seemed soft and enticing from her position. Ingrid swallowed and kept her mind in her only task.

It was easy if she divided the hair, each lock secured between her fingers, her mind seeing the movement her hands would complete over and over, making sure she was on the right track every time. Her voice hummed a soft tune, sometimes vocalizing a word, no permission of her mind granted for such little act of rebellion. And yet she couldn’t help it.

Dorothea didn’t say anything, as Ingrid braided her hair, singing in a voice so small that was almost beyond recognition, to the fair maiden of dawn, the most beautiful woman among them all. She sang and her fingers, trembling still, braided her locks one by one, till her hair was an intricate headband that was worthy of queens and warriors alike. And as she did, she just focused on how her fingertips used to leather and steel caressed silk and cotton, and how that little feeling got hold in her chest, clenching her heart and setting her skin on fire. How her limbs tingled and her spine shuddered. And as her voice, small and low, sang through the old fables that were her partners and siblings during her childhood, it gained the confidence and warmth of a task that was made out of love, and love only.

Whether she realized or not.

Whether she wanted to realize or not.

When she finished, she let her song die, setting her hands on Dorothea’s shoulders and feeling her hot skin, her muscles soft and tender, the almost impossible tremble there. Ingrid dug her fingers slightly in her flesh, just enough to feel her there.

To feel her there.

Real.

Close.

So close.

Her eyes, a treasure she feared she’d never see enough, looked at her. For the first time, she wasn’t afraid of them. She wasn’t just mesmerized by them. She wasn’t impatient to shun them. And in the calm of her newfound bravery, she found silence.

And in the silence, resolution.

In her green eyes, an invitation.

In her face, now framed by a beautiful headband made with her own hair, a flattening look as the ones the wise used to praise the goddesses with, she found her lips parted and her expression aching for something neither of them could have alone.

But could complete it if they met in the middle.

Her necklace with the most important family heirloom hung from her neck as she tilted forward.

Ingrid licked her lips unconsciously, before closing the distance, Dorothea not moving, in her lap, looking at her eyes, and her lips, her eyes.

And then only at her lips.

In the silence of a forest she didn’t know, Ingrid kissed her.

* * *

The stars shone equally from everywhere in the world, thought Ingrid, looking up at the sky, sitting on the saddle she had been using those days. They were back next to the shore, and the sound of the waves never resting was a lullaby that helped her mind to calm down, gently taking her to slower times, to a state where she could lay out her thoughts and worries and just look at them, with no further fears or pressing needs.

She just sat there, looking at the night sky, seeing the wolves in the sky chasing in an endless circle, the star that guided them there, the smaller of the deers in the sky, all the figures that composed the stars in her mind.

“Ingrid.” She looked up, Felix was there, his usual disinterested demeanor a facade for his real worries behind them.

“Felix, is it something wrong?”

“No, I suppose.” He sat next to her, his stance wide even when resting. They shared a silence they knew couldn’t continue. It was strange, Felix was one of the only people she could spend time with without the need of saying anything. Yet that had been broken since they had arrived at this foreign land, sowing terror in its inhabitants and doubts in her heart.

The camp was far enough for them to barely hear their laughing and singing.

Ingrid kept looking at the stars, her lance between her legs, her Mjölnir hot in her chest. Her thoughts turned around a single person.

“How long has it been since we arrived?” Felix had picked a rock from the soil, gravel near the shore, and played with it in his fingers. Ingrid shrugged, she hadn’t paid that much attention to it.

“A month, maybe a bit more.”

“I’d say more.” He didn’t look at her, his eyes fixed in the little pebble. He didn’t have to look at her, she knew how he felt just by listening to him. “We haven’t found much, but have found something, and maybe we’ll find worthy opponents, but…” He threw the pebble away, its fall swallowed by the night. “You found something, didn’t you?”

“Felix…”

“Don’t tell Sylvain, he can’t keep his mouth shut.” He picked another pebble. “Is it dangerous?”

“... Yes.”

“Most good things are, you can’t wield a sword if you’re afraid to cut yourself…” He threw the pebble and picked a different one. “You like it? Enough as to keep taking the scouting missions and disappearing for hours?”

“Yes.”

He took a pebble, the last one, and looked at it intensely. “We fight together, my sword will always be by your side. I’m your brother of arms, I won’t tell.” He raised to his feet, putting the pebble in his pocket. “But remember, we’re bound to leave, Ingrid. Our drakkars will take us home maybe sooner than later if we don’t find what the Boar is looking for.” He patted her shoulder briefly and left. For Felix it was a declaration of love so open and selfless that made her throat sting, closing with the hot and strong grip of the guilt she felt.

Yet, there was another demon in her heart feasting on her emotions.

She knew she shouldn’t.

And she had failed to care. And then she had refused to care.

And now she was so in deep she could care, but couldn’t get away.

Dorothea.

Her lips weren’t just soft, they were sweet, and her moans were glorious and her panting intoxicating. Ingrid wanted to drink from her every day, as the warriors did from the never-ending mugs in Valhalla.

She wanted to eat her skin in kisses and bites, as the fallen brave fighters would do in the immense meadow of Fólkvangr.

With her eyes closed, and the song of the ocean behind, she could draw everything else away from her but the shape of the woman she had had under the blue sky, her hands grabbing her neck and hair as she kissed her, her body blossoming and blooming under her hands, responding to her hungry mouth, inviting her tongue to get a fill of her white skin.

She opened to her touch like the lakes in early spring, when they thaw and the water ran free again, flowing in a thunderous stream that nurtured the land around them. And she thought of them when she kissed her thighs, her own spring to discover buried beneath them, a source of pleasures she had given up so long ago.

Dorothea.

She had been so responsive under her shy fingers, her muscles twitching and her back arching, her breasts had fed her and delighted her and marveled her. She had sworn in Frigg’s name she had never seen a woman so beautiful, a voice so enticing, a scent so intoxicating, a being so mesmerizing.

And as such she had just surrendered herself, a battle she had never been willing to fight and had lost since the first moment she had set her eyes upon the woman.

Ingrid sighed, rubbing her face with her hands.

She had come undone, a mix of pleas and words she couldn’t understand, but she felt through her own skin, their bodies trembling in unison, the final cry she had silenced with a kiss. Ingrid, in that exact moment, wished for it to be hers and only hers. She had taken that cry in her mouth and drank from it, making sure no other creature could ever rejoice in it. And as the waves of their pleasure had decreased, gently rocking them back into their own reality, she had held her close, using her body as a shield from the world that wouldn’t see them together.

That couldn’t see them together.

The stars, up in the sky, were the same in this land than back at home.

* * *

“This is Mjölnir, it’s Thor’s hammer and weapon. A gift of Loki, the god of mischief and treachery.” She had the silver hammer in her left hand, as her right served for a pillow for Dorothea’s head. They were nacked, and content, their hearts throbbing and their senses filled. “He can destroy mountains with a single blow, the thunder in the sky his doing when he wields Mjölnir.”

Dorothea hummed, curling into her, her hand drawing a lazy pattern in her chest and breast. A playful pinch at her nipple made Ingrid shiver.

“Thor, Loki, Frejya… so many… how you remember?” She asked, her breath tingling in her shoulder, making her turn to look at her.

“They’re gods, their stories shaped us, it’s normal to remember them.” Ingrid led in the touch of Dorothea’s hand in her cheek, accepting her parted lips in an open, lazy kiss. She opened her mouth and received her tongue with a content hum, it was heavy still with her own taste, as their orgasm calmed down and they talked about little things or big things.

It had turned into their routine, holding each other as they talked about the big things that composed their worlds, never talking about the crucial things that defined their encounters.

Dorothea didn’t mention how she was always able to keep track of Ingrid’s group.

Ingrid never told her how long they pretended to go through this country, pillaging and looting, looking for something their leader hadn’t quite told them yet.

They met still, and talked about their beliefs, about their lives, the little things that composed the biggest details of their routines. Dorothea would take her hands, would run her thumb through each of her fingers, feeling there the rough skin used for war and would ask her how old she was the first time she picked up a weapon. How old she was when she first went on an expedition.

How old she planned to be when she decided to go back to her homeland and never adventure in a drakkar again.

She’d answer them to the best of her knowledge, enjoying how her body curled up against her bare skin.

This had happened several times in the last month, as their expedition lengthened and her time with the woman extended before her eyes. She was playing a dangerous game, yet she couldn’t stop herself from doing so.

She didn’t want to stop, and maybe that was the biggest problem.

As a result, Ingrid was telling Dorothea a brief version of the tales of her gods, and Dorothea listened to her, her eyes fixed in her lips that created words so complicated with such ease. She talked to her as she would’ve to any other of her friends and peers back in the common hall from her village. She realized this in an alarmed, small part in her consciousness, she was letting the woman in, seeing her not as a foreigner, not as a distraction, not even as a divine apparition that conquered her with an irresistible power that no mortal could ever dare to oppose.

She was thinking of her as an equal, a woman made out of flesh and skin and a beating heart just as hers.

It was even more dangerous.

“My Ingrid, so many gods, so many stories, it’s really… diverse.” She said pepping little kisses in her shoulder and collarbone. “Here there’s only one, the one true god, they say.” Dorothea propped up using her forearms, her breasts gently brushing Ingrid’s and making her breath hitch as her heart rate picked up a different pace.

Ingrid grabbed her by her waist, keeping her anchored and them joined by their hips, Dorothea raised an eyebrow, secured in the place. Ingrid’s strength had perplexed her before, and now it aroused her, so many possibilities behind those strong, willing muscles.

“Do you believe in it? That guy on a cross, how does he talk to you if he isn’t speaking through the thunders or his voice is carried by the wind? How do you know you’ll be by his side in the afterlife?” She asked, curious, intrigued as of why people would believe in a divinity that left no real trace of its power behind. The brunette smiled at her, kissing her softly again, as to answer her questions and stop her inquiries.

“I don’t have an answer to those questions, I’m no expert in the faith, but I can sing you what they sing in mass, if that helps.” She said, her breath tickling her lips, her eyes a talisman that Ingrid couldn’t hope to resist. She nodded, mute, taken by the desire to receive everything and anything that Dorothea wanted to offer her. The brunette smiled, playfully wiggling her waist so Ingrid would let go of her grip on her soft skin, to sit upright, cleared her throat and gifted her a song that was composed of feelings and words she couldn’t hope to comprehend.

But that shook her to her core.

Dorothea’s voice was strong, passionate, rich, as if it was a gift from Bragi himself, who had hand-picked her and granted her with a skill and a master in her voice no other woman could compete against. Ingrid laid there, on the ground and looked at her, basting in her presence, longing for her very soul to mingle with hers, till the two of them would never be separated again until the both of them just were a single essence that would spend the rest of eternity in a blissful and quiet world, where none of the circumstances that surrounded them could ever touch them, none of the dangers that breathed near them, waiting for the right moment to strike, would ever lay a hand on them.

Her brown hair, locks of silk, was free to run through her back, her voice steady as she reached high peaks and then descended with ease to low valleys, her breasts a magical curve that was crowned by her nipples, hills, slopes and mountains Ingrid wanted to memorize and burn in her mind, how they answered to the silent pleas in her fingertips, how they were soft and responsive when she pressed her tongue against them.

She was a fire, a bonfire that crackled and burned so bright in an endless abyss she’d rather drown in it than just miss a second of her warmth. Beautiful, ethereal, untamable.

How was she supposed to resist? If this was a test from the gods, it was an unfair one.

And they’d burn, they’d consume themselves in their own fire, too fast, too bright, too strong to really last.

Dorothea kissed her when she finished her song, and Ingrid was powerless to do anything else but accept her and let her heart and mind be swept away by that endless, crashing ocean that she would never safely sail through. An ocean that couldn’t be weather, that couldn’t be contained.

Her eyes, closed, her face, frowned, her lips sealed but to a single word. “Dorothea.”

The wave that followed was gigantic, a wall of water that crashed and sparkled, foam covering her vision and air failing to fill her. Her throat had been screaming the praises to the woman that had taken her and now was raw and confused.

She was raw, confused, filled, content.

Her panting ragged and her heart racing told a story that should’ve never been told.

Ingrid looked at her again, when her senses returned and her mind formed coherent, cohesive thoughts again, the bittersweet feeling she couldn’t let go of was there again, pressing her throat and her lips to say something and end it. She couldn’t have asked for that much happiness, she couldn’t deserve that much pleasure contained in less than half an hour. Dorothea’s smile was a gift she intended to preserve to the end of her days.

Her lips parted to add something else, to say something and keep their interaction going now through words instead of actions, but her honed senses came back to life, telling her something was off, picking up something that would alarm her no matter the circumstances.

She sat up immediately, looking around as her right hand grabbed her necklace and her left looked for her clothes.

“Ingrid?” Dorothea called, getting up with her, noticing her distress and frowning, all the lazy satisfaction air that had just engulfed her disappeared.

“I hear something.” She got up, putting on her pants and buckling her belt with her dagger hanging from it. Her lover followed quickly, her dress covering her skin at a god-like speed. Ingrid forced her senses at their limit, squinting her eyes as she moved around the patch of trees they had picked that day to make love. She saw them at the far end of a harvest field, marching with heavy armor and bright weapons.

It was a prepared battalion in the direction of her camp.

Cursing under her breath she buttoned her shirt in no time and rushed to her mare. Dorothea was behind her, her emerald eyes already registered the armed men, and her grim face a witness of her mind.

“I need to go, I must outrun them…” Ingrid stopped her hands in her saddle, her shoulders tense. “Will you be alright without me?” She asked when she wanted to ask if she knew anything about them.

“Yes.” Dorothea looked at her, motioning her to go already. Ingrid nodded, hopping up and spurring the mare away. She’d have to trust her.

She’d have to believe in her.

Ingrid arched over the mare’s neck and spurred her to go faster, to gallop swiftly as the wind in a storm, acutely aware of how short of time she was.

She’d have to choose to turn a blind eye on all the questions she should’ve asked Dorothea.

Her feet were on top of the saddle, instead of the stirrups, her body moving as one with the powerful strides under her, her throat closed and her weapons clattering as they jumped in unison streams and burrows, the mare wheezing and her neck and her haunches covered in foam. She left the battalion behind, the green fields behind, the little forest behind. In her eyes, the ocean appeared and the drakkars were there, a familiar sight to her aching body.

She was close.

“Enemies!” She cried as she made her way through camp, the warriors getting out of the way of her powerful race and at the same time close enough to understand her. “Enemies upon us!” The mare stopped, hooves lifting up earth and rocks as she slid to a halt. Dimitri was there, shouting orders and suddenly the camp boiled with activity, all of them grabbing weapons and shields, gearing up, laughing as they got ready to prove themselves worthy of the gods once more.

Ingrid’s legs trembled, her knees buckling, when she got off the mare, letting her run free and out of the way. She wouldn’t fight on top of a mount that day.

Felix touched her shoulder, handling her helmet to her, a sober look in his eyes. She nodded as she put it on and grabbed a quick sip of water to calm her raw throat.

Their enemies would meet their weapons and they’d cry their tears in blood that day.

And at night, when everything had passed, Ingrid would lay awake thinking about the woman she’d spent so much time with and knew so little about.

In the fire so dangerous and lawless she had willingly let herself be burned in.

* * *

Ingrid was washing herself up, naked from her hips, when she heard the cries of “Riders!”. Her shirt almost tore as she put it on, buttoning it up as she grabbed her lance, a dagger still hanging from her waist.

She hadn’t seen any signs of messengers in her scouting, despite her distractions, she had dutifully examined the zone and just found small villages and the army she had seen the day before when she had made it in time to sound the alarm in camp. Her strides were fast as she crossed the men at disarray and caught the helmet and shield that Sylvain threw her way. She was somewhat ready, armed as she could when she arrived by Dimitri’s side at the other end of their camp. The riders were upon them by then.

Just three, lonely riders.

Two men and a woman, a strange view in such lands.

Dorothea.

The cry in her throat was so deep that it never was truly born, cutting her guts and her mind alike. Wounding her and confusing her. She bit her lip, her eyes concealed under the gloss of a summer that was turning into autumn, her eyes protected by the helmet Sylvain had provided her, her eyes looking for Dorothea’s, who kept her green glare on Dimitri only.

This was what happened when she didn’t think through. When she left her own wild wishes to take control of her.

The grip in her lance was so strong she could feel the wood under her fingers compressing, her bones cracking and her knuckles trembling. Ingrid would need several minutes, after that council was finished, to be able to open her hand again and, when she did, it’d be with a wince so pronounced her jaw would clench on its own and her fingers would protest every movement.

But it didn’t matter now.

It would never matter.

Her poor choices were there to haunt her, to bite her, to tear her apart piece by piece. A devastating show she couldn’t bear to watch and yet had to endure in her own flesh.

“Dimitri.” The main in the center called, a dark shadow on top of an even darker horse.

Everything made sense. That’s how she had learned so quickly her language, that’s how she had always been able to be around, that’s how she had just conquered her without raising her blade not even once after their second encounter when Dorothea must have decided to do what her loyalties called for.

As Ingrid had done before.

Those were the cruel rules of the game they had decided to play.

“Our Emperor wishes to have a word with you.” The man spurred the horse, getting a couple of steps closer. Ingrid considered them enough to point her lance at him, her eyes a death sentence waiting to be dispatched. His words were tainted by an accent so foreign to them it sounded like a different language, but they could understand him nonetheless.

“At ease, Ingrid. We’ll hear this.” Dimitri said, motioning her to lower her spear. She gritted her teeth and obeyed, her eyes again Dorothea. The woman didn’t look at her, yet she could see a trace of grief in her expression.

She had been a fool.

She had been a willing fool.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was really fun to write. I must thank LinaLuthor and Edelgard_Eisner for helping me work some of the scenes I wasn't really sure about.
> 
> Next chapter should be up soon this week, til then, take care!


	3. Fólkvangr and Valhalla, painted in green

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I thought I'd hate you..."
> 
> "Ingrid..."
> 
> "Why don't I hate you?"
> 
> "I..."
> 
> "Why do I still want you?"
> 
> "Stop, please..."
> 
> "Did you love me? Did you at least like me?"
> 
> "... Ingrid"
> 
> "Please, I need to know. I deserve to know.”

Her father left her two possessions she had never let go of, and would never do until the end of her days. Her silver Mjölnir, her companion and protector in every battle since she was thirteen, and Luin, a lance that had served her in every battle, a blade she had kept sharp and shielded from rust and weather dutifully.

He had told her that the edge of a blade was only worthy when it was sharp and cold.

He had told her that she was the gift and pride of their family.

He had told her she was destined to save their family and complete what he couldn’t.

She had done it, she had done every single thing he had told her.

And now, free of those promises, those expectations, she found herself burning in a fire of her doing.

The room was empty and stuffy, the stone walls doing little to refresh the sultriness of late summer. She was sitting on the ground, despite the chairs that were laying around, the beds against the walls that would welcome her and her companions, Luin was on her thighs, its edge looking at her, mocking her.

She wished she could take a whetstone and sharp it already.

She hadn’t been granted such a request. She had been lucky to keep the family heirloom with her, yet it would’ve been too suspicious to completely disarm them.

Just taking away their shields was enough, for now.

This Emperor the shadow had talked about, Dimitri had been keen to speak to her, and had accepted the terms to meet her. They had, wary, lifted up camp and followed the three riders with their weapons ready. Waiting for an ambush or an army at every turn of the way. Some of the warriors had taken their drakkars to follow them, as the castle they were destined to go to was next to the sea.

Some of the drakkars had turned and left, however, stirring up loud cries and curses, cowards that ran at the first sight of trouble weren't worthy to be under Dimitri's banner and yet, she, who had slept with one of their guides, rode beside him, listening to his rude conversation with the last rider, a man of orange hair and flowery manners that spoke their language poorly and smiled too much for her to trust him.

And there they were, inside a structure they didn't know under the watch of a man she didn't trust and near the woman she had lost her sanity to. Ingrid kept her eyes on Luin, her loyal companion strong and unshaken in her hands. She wished for Sylvain and Felix to be there, she wished for them to be by her side and to give her that maybe false sense of protection, that idea of normality when the three of them were together, a unit the world wouldn't bring down unless it poured all its resources into it.

Sylvain would say something ridiculous, Felix would scowl at him, she'd sigh and lecture them both.

It was safe and known.

Ingrid, for a moment, wished to be a coward and to have remained back at home, nescient to all the new world they had been exploring, ignorant to the thrill of the fight and the cold of the death.

Unaware of the green in Dorothea's eyes, so exotic, so enticing, so dangerous.

So irresistible.

The door opened behind her, soft as its wood creaked and wailed. She heard the steps coming closer, she heard the soft rustle of the silky dress, she heard the lack of clattering that always accompanied Sylvan and Felix.

Her heart, closed in a fist, skipped a beat and rejoiced and regretted in equal parts.

"Ingrid." Her voice was small, and yet, warm. 

Ingrid was powerless because of her, she would always be powerless when her green eyes looked at hers.

It had been a game she had been fated to lose from the very beginning.

"Hey." Ingrid looked up, at her green eyes that had started her downfall and couldn't find in herself the rage and wrath to curse her name and spit at her feet. She, instead, found that she was tired of keeping facades and silencing questions she had been afraid to ask. "So this is it, right?" 

"I..." Dorothea crouched, her hands on her knees, looking for her eyes with an honest and yet sad look dominating her face. "I guess it is, at least for us."

"If this it's the end, then I can ask you all the questions I didn't because I wanted to have you a day longer." Ingrid let go of Luin, settling it carefully on the floor between them, a line that separated them in a physical way, a wall tangible and painful.

And yet necessary.

"How did you keep track of me all this time? What does this Emperor of yours truly want? Did you know about the mercenaries and soldiers they sent our way so many times?" Those were the easy questions, the questions she was sure she knew the answers for but wanted to hear it from her lips.

She'd ask the hard questions later, not fearing now that time would run short for them.

Not now, when their time was, after all, finished.

Dorothea smiled, a broken smile, and kept her hands to herself. Ingrid knew the gesture before it was intervened, Dorothea had smiled and taken her hands many times before, she had done it not so long ago, in what seemed a different life.

"It wasn't easy, you move fast and never stay much time in the same place. But stealth isn't your strong suite when a trail of pillaged towns is so easy to follow. The Emperor, Edelgard, she..."Dorothea bit her lip, thinking in her next words, maybe asking herself how to correctly enunciate them, maybe asking herself how much she really wanted to share with the north savage that she should have never put her eyes on. "She's my friend, she seems to have some quarrel unresolved with Dimitri, or at least that's what I think. This whole idea was Hubert's, however."

"Hubert?"

"The tall, gloomy guy." She smiled, a true smile for a second, before a bitter tint took hold of her features. "I didn't know about the battalions sent your way, if I had orders to keep you from scouting them, I would've made a better work, don't you think?"

Ingrid laughed humorlessly, a bitter sound that hurt her as it was born.

Of course she would have done so.

"Was it a lie?" And that was a hard question. The first one she had the courage to ask, because Ingrid Brand Galatea wasn't a coward.

And because asking that specific question made her recognize that it had never been a lie to her.

Dorothea's smile changed, once more, and now was so full of emotions Ingrid wasn't sure she could name them all.

"No, I wish it was. It would be easier..." Tears welled up in her eyes, but she continued, her voice steady as she weathered her emotions. "It was always an edge, we were walking on a field we were never to be on, a line we should never have crossed."

"It doesn't matter now..." Ingrid looked at her hands, she had her gauntlets on, leather rough and patches of metal that didn't really grant that much protection. Yet it was better than nothing, at least she had something covering her skin, her burning wish to grab Dorothea's hand and let herself lost in her touch again.

"It does matter… to me at least." Dorothea wasn't hesitant to reach out to her, touching her cheek and gently coaxing her into looking at her eyes. In the green she now knew was forbidden she saw her reflection, she saw how broke and devastated she looked.

She saw defeat in her own eyes and her mouth frowned, her chest heavy with sorrow, her belly turning in despair.

"Why?" Ingrid wasn't a fool, despite her emotions running wild and getting the best of her, despite all the risks she had taken in the past months, in that long, scorching summer. She wasn't a fool and she knew what Dorothea was doing there.

She was trying to get her out of the trap they had walked into.

And Ingrid knew exactly what she needed to do.

She'd stall them until it was too late for her to escape. Until she was bound to the place where her comrades would fight to the last consequences. She was tired of trying to be something else than a warrior, than a soldier, than an explorer.

She was willing to burn in that wildfire, let her life be consumed by it and her memories be the fuel that kept her going through that day, maybe her last, to the very end. She'd rather do so than escaping back home, to wither under the questioning look of the mountains and the gods that requested only for one thing from her.

Bravery.

To run back home and hear the defiant voice of the wind telling her how she had disgraced all she had dedicated her life to.

Dorothea, ignorant of her thoughts running free and wild in her mind, caressed her cheek with her thumb.

"How could I not? You let me go that day, you seemed the incarnation of a deadly divinity, yet so beautiful, so free… how could I stop myself from wanting you? I'm still helpless to what I feel for you, I'm helpless when I look at you, Ingrid... " She was crying now, her tears falling free. Her eyes were specially green that day.

Ingrid leaned into her hand, unable to stop herself.

"I wish we could've had more time and at the same time I wish you and I had never met." She said, covering soft skin with rough leather, anchoring her hand there.

"You're the sweetest lie I ever lived, the only lie I couldn't let go of… The only one that I wished was true." Dorothea tilted her head, their foreheads touching, their breaths mingling and mixing into one. "Ingrid… there's no more time, you need to leave."

"I loved you, I think I still do." Dorothea laughed at this, her laughter strained as it fought to keep sobs at bay.

"You shouldn't, I'm not your ally."

"You never were."

"Neither were you, yet you let me go."

"You fought with more intent and bravery than soldiers I know..."

"Ingrid..." Whatever followed she never heard, Ingrid kissed her, a short intense kiss, and another.

Another.

Another.

Until they both had run out of air and her heart was swelling in sadness and content in equal parts.

"Ingrid, stop, you need to leave… I talked to Edie, she won't chase you down, I'll keep Hubert at bay, but you need to..." Ingrid silenced her with a kiss, grabbing both her cheeks with her palms.

She was doomed already, her views in death and life so different from Dorothea's made the acceptance easier. Maybe her own throbbing heart made it easier.

Maybe she was as much of a fool as she thought she was.

"I thought I'd hate you..."

"Ingrid..."

"Why don't I hate you?"

"I..."

"Why do I still want you?"

"Stop, please..."

"Did you love me? Did you at least like me?"

"... Ingrid"

"Please, I need to know. I deserve to know.”

"I did… I do..." Ingrid kissed her again, painfully aware of how time was flowing to its final mark. To the moment her life and her death would meet, a single second that would contain everything she was, all the possibilities, all the decisions, every single interaction.

Everything she could've been.

Everything in just one simple second, compressed and gone.

And her life lost, to the endless abyss that had been the wildfire that burned them both.

"I knew I shouldn't have liked you, I shouldn't have talked to you. I don't regret a single thing..." Before Dorothea could answer hell broke loose near them, shouts and cries as things broke and armors clattered and furniture got destroyed.

So that was it. Time was finally up.

"Quickly, you need to leave now!" Dorothea grabbed her, tugging her, trying to shove her out of that castle, out of that trap, out of her life.

Ingrid was immovable.

She took Luin in her hands and accepted her fate with the same grace she had accepted every battle she had been in before.

"Ingrid..."

"Dorothea, get out of here. You're in danger if they see you with me."

"You can still leave, if you just-"

"Love." Her voice was collected, her tone calm, it was the name that her heart had decided to call her that struck her. Love. Dorothea looked at her, understanding dawning on her, breaking through the denial she had been through all their talk, her eyes now completely engulfed by tears, her voice unable to muster the strength to call her.

Yet she tried.

"No, no, you can't..."

"Remember me fondly, will you? I wish to be a good memory, at the very least." Ingrid smiled at her, the first time since their last encounter out in the open, and grasped Luin with force, her demeanor changing, her mind and body preparing for battle.

Before Dorothea could try to change her mind again, the door opened with a blast, letting through Sylvain and Felix, who were poorly armed and sustained some injuries already. They were looking for her, of course, to join the fray and fight as they usually did. Felix opened his mouth and closed it immediately upon seeing Dorothea. His weapon pointing at her and his eyes wide and calculating.

Sylvain, behind him, couldn't smile to her, his frown pronounced and his face contorted in pain.

Ingrid used her body as a shield for Dorothea, pointing her lance against her old friends, her comrades in arms, her fellow countrymen. Sylvain and Felix were perplexed, their weapons unsure in their grips for the first time of their lives. She bit her lower lip and stood her ground, lowering her stance and widening her feet and knees.

If this was the place where she’d meet her end, she’d make sure to mark it with her blood till the soil itself would remember her name and her face.

Her grip around her lance was strong, the solid, heavy wood of the handle polished by her hands after so many years of wielding it. The steel in its edge was sharp and deadly, already stained by the blood of others she had slain to protect what she treasured over everything else.

“Ingrid… what are you doing?” Sylvain demanded, his own weapon pointing down, his usually cheerful eyes looking for an explanation she couldn’t give.

There was no explanation for what she wanted to do, no logical reason for what she felt.

And yet it didn’t make it any less real.

“Let us go, Sylvain, Felix. I don’t want to fight you, just let us through before the imperial army arrives and, if you won’t have that , let her go…” She looked at both of them, her eyes heavy, her tone a whispering plea, her chest trembling and her shoulders shaking as she realized the weight of what she was about to say. “Please… let her go.”

“There’s no time, they’re already in the castle. This was a stupid idea and yet the Boar rammed into it blindly.” Felix pointed to the door behind them, where they had come from. “They’ll be here in no time, and they outnumber us four to one at least…”

“Ingrid, stop this nonsense, we need to…”

“Sylvain.” Felix’s voice was deep, tense, heavy with meaning, and understanding. Strong with resolution and authority. His friend, his lover, his companion through their lives looked at him and smiled. A tense, sad smile.

“I know… So that’s the way it is, then.” His colorful hair escaped his helmet and was wild when the metal didn’t keep it in place. He gave Ingrid a meaningful look, so many feelings there she couldn’t tell them all apart.

They hit her nonetheless.

Dorothea behind her grabbed her shoulder, tugging her trying to get them away. She wouldn’t budge, she’d rooted herself and not even Thor himself would be able to divert her from her goal.

Felix nodded at her once, and turned, his sword deadly and ready again, a grey lighting that would bring death in the blink of an eye. Sylvain copied his posture. His lance pointed away from her, his weapon a shield for his friend to escape, to try, to get away as they died for her.

For them.

Her voice broke when she tried to use it again, forcing a shaky “What are you doing?” out of her dry lips.

“We’re earning our place in Valhalla today.” Answered Sylvain, his voice muffled by the screams and the yelling of the incoming soldiers, the battalion that had already killed many of her fellow warriors. The men she would never make away from them in time. She closed her eyes, the time flowing slowly in her mind. Her own raging heart calming it’s beating and throbbing in her ears.

Her family’s heirloom, her silver Mjölnir necklace, heavy and hot in her neck, pressing against her chest, telling her what the right decision was. Telling Ingrid her time to die and prove her worth before the gods had arrived. She felt strangely calm, her path, her life, coming to the eye of her mind and keeping her centered and peaceful. She saw the lakes and rivers from her homeland, the white kissed mountains and felt the sharp wind cutting her skin and shuffling her hair as it made its way from the undaunted profile of the mountains. She saw her siblings, all of them adults now that had lived under her care. She saw her parents, too broken and crippled to hold an axe but still proud of their heritage. She saw the drakkar that would take her from her home to unseen territory, Dimitri on the bow pointing them towards their next goal, Sylvain joking as he chatted idly, Felix sharpening his sword, a never-ending task to which he devoted himself, Ashe and Dedue fishing, talking about their fair ladies back home, talking about the children that awaited them.

She saw Dorothea’s eyes, green and deep, powerful, and gorgeous.

She knew that she’d leave this world with no heavy burdens in her heart.

Ingrid turned, letting go of her spear and taking Dorothea’s hands in hers. “We won’t make it, not the two of us. Get out of here, Dorothea. The army won’t touch you when they know who you are and how powerful your connections run.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Love, I can’t live in a world where you’re no more, but I can die for you, in your country, so my bones are to nurture the land that will keep you safe. That’s… my last gift for you.” She took her hands to her lips, kissing them, her eyebrows frowned, her throat tight.

A last parting gift.

She leaned forward and their foreheads touched, their breaths mixed and their spirits connected in a plane she didn’t know how to reach other than in Ingrid’s arms after they had reached a climax filled with sentiments and words made to no one else but them.

“No, no, no, we can make it, I can talk to Edie, it’s gonna be fine, Ingrid…” Dorothea couldn’t finish her plea, Ingrid was kissing her, and there were sadness and love, and fondness, there were peace and suffering.

Sorrow in a beautiful gesture she’d keep close to her heart till the end of her days.

There were so many things they said in a silent kiss, as the world around them shifted and turned, and the cries became louder and Sylvain and Felix stood their ground, gritting their teeth awaiting the worst. There was, however, one single thing that kiss missed.

Hope.

Dorothea didn’t have another chance to look at her lover, at the woman that had arrived with a north wind to her country and her life, at the woman that had been so different from everything she had ever known and yet had shaken her to the core.

Dorothea didn’t have the chance to tell her that she loved her, as Ingrid used her impossible strength to send her spinning away, at the loud voice of “Get her out!” and the smaller man, Felix she thought in her mind completely taken away by grief, grabbed her by her waist and pushed her through the door. She clashed against the other wall in the hallway and the imperial soldiers were there, marching towards her and screaming something about savages in the east wing.

She couldn’t see Ingrid one last time, drowning in the pain of knowing she hadn’t realized that had been their last kiss, their last look, the last time their breaths mingled and mixed into a single one that was their very essence that gave wings to a love that was doom to end violently.

A soldier grabbed her and took her away, as she screamed for them to let her go, as she screamed for them to let them be.

She was taken to the Emperor who, days later, would give the three remaining warriors a funeral as their traditions asked for.

* * *

Ingrid still tingled with that kiss, her lips upward in a small, satisfied smile, her lance back in her hands, her thoughts back again racing and her muscles tensed and ready.

The image of the mountains back home was a memory that distanced itself in a blur. She’d never see them again. She’d fight to be by Odin’s or Frejya’s side now.

She’d fight to numb and silence the howling pain in her chest.

The soldiers poured into the huge room one by one, the door keeping their large numbers at bay. Ingrid saw how Sylvain impaled the first one, his spear in and out of his neck, followed by Felix’s sword, disemboweling the one that tried to get close to his lover when he was defenseless.

Ingrid moved forward and engaged in combat.

This was it.

This was it.

Her spear was tainted again by someone else's blood when she moved in and cut deep into a soldier’s thigh to keep them from touching Felix.

She cried, and her voice was filled with the last will of the last battle in her life.

Dorothea was never the first one to leave a plane, she tended to be the last, and as a result, she was usually long times in queues, waiting for her passport to get stamped and her fingerprints and picture taken, before walking to retrieve her luggage. She felt like airports where places made for people to cruise on them or run through them. And she was not one to run unless she was on the scenery, the whole theater at her feet, her voice the only thunderous sound in their world.

Dorothea knew that cruising, sometimes, would take her further than just ramming through life without a sense of direction, and she applied that logic as well as she moved around the stores before the luggage pick-up, eyeing them with not that much of interest.

Ingrid fell back, Sylvain and Felix next to her, her stamina was starting to waver, she’d soon be running in her last reserves, her breath ragged, her eyes blinking fast to keep the sweat out of her eyes. Her feet shifted quickly, her arms strong as she moved her spear in a circular motion, keeping their enemies at bay enough for her brothers in arms to kill the soldiers that tried to get to them. The ones that had no face as they fell, replaced by a new wave. She clenched her jaw as Luin came back to her and she thrusted it forward again, the slitting sound now a deaf sound instead of the high clear pitched it had to be.

The edge of Luin started to go blunt after so many battles, so many enemies, so much death.

The whistle of an arrow barely grazing her helmet made her shudder. Their time was almost up, yet they'd take as many as they could with them 

The wind didn’t blow in that room, it wouldn’t take her last thoughts to her love. She knew this, and yet she was at peace.

The treadmill that moved her luggage was slow, maybe even slower than the man at the booth that checked her passport with a blank face. She had been charming, of course, as always, but it wasn’t an easy task when the person in question decided to not even answer her polite questions and her greeting. Yet she was there, half of it done. She’d get her suitcase and get to her hotel. Big presentations were due soon and she was a professional. She’d let them hear her voice and rejoice in it.

Dorothea looked through the windows as the treadmill still refused to spit her suitcase, the day outside was gray and she could guess how cold the air would be, ready to stop her breathing for a second when she walked out of the building into the northern land she had never visited before. It was beautiful still, like a frozen frame that was dangerous and enticing at the same time.

Sylvain kept fighting by her side, despite the arrows that stuck out of his chest and the blood that ran from his mouth. Ingrid rushed to shield him from an axe blow, in other circumstances she’d cursed her lack of a real shield, abandoned in the armory of a castle they had been fool enough to enter, but there was no point in cursing when they were dead already. The handle of her lance took the blunt force of the strike, breaking in two in a burst of splinters and the loud cracking sound of something that had broken in a way that could never be recovered. She used the piece in her left hand, the one that still had the blade dripping blood firmly attached to it, to stab the warrior once, twice, at least three times before he fell, crying for the last time to a god she didn’t pay any respect to. Felix got close to them, Sylvain still in his feet, panting and trembling, his blood mixing with the blood of their enemies on the wooden floor of the room.

They’d all be with their loved ones soon.

Soon.

Soon, as soon as she was through customs Dorothea would give Edelgard a call, let her friend know she’d made it safe to strange lands, and tease her about her new girlfriend, that strange, yet endearing lady that seemed to be walking on clouds every single day. As soon as the officer that had decided to take her suitcase for a closer inspection would have it, of course.

“I’m sorry, miss, it’s a routinary procedure.” He said, a voice deep and rich despite the language settling strangely in his tongue, used to words in a different idiom, as his large bulky frame managed to shrink into a bow. She decided that even if he was stalling her longer than she needed, she liked him. Besides, she had time.

There was no hurry in getting out of the airport still.

Life escaped him with no hurry and yet relentless.

Sylvain was now behind them, his hushed, hurried breaths the last ones, they knew. Ingrid didn’t want to think about it, but she could feel the life in her friend’s body escaping from all his wounds, from the blood that seemed never ready to stop flowing, from his smile tainted in red as his eyes lost focus and his words lost meaning.

Felix’s knees were buckling noticeable now, his strikes fast and precise, but his elbows shaking from the effort to keep his blade up, to defy his enemies with his swordsmanship.

To elevate his prayers within a metallic sound that contained all his beliefs in a single cut.

Her hands still held both ends of her spear, Luin serving her after its death. An arrow, fast, unseen, hit her in her left shoulder, tearing away from her a painful cry, making her let go of Luin’s end. Another arrow flew and pierced Felix’s right elbow.

His sword clattered when it hit the ground, now just a tool, a red, grim tool.

Ingrid looked at her hands, covered by leather gauntlets, and breathed in a shaky sigh.

She was in no hurry to die, but the world was in a hurry to collapse itself into her, a sealing blackness to her vision, blurring from the exhaustion and the pain.

“Thank you very kindly.” Dorothea smiled at the man, as she took her suitcase and made her way through the last set of doors and was out in the main hall of the airport. She walked through the taxi drivers offering their services, looking at her phone distractedly, turning on the mobile data, and her roaming to send Edelgard a text, maybe a raunchy one if it got her to blush.

The device in her hand vibrated as it came back to life, several notifications appearing on the screen as she reviewed them, opening some, sliding away other ones.

She stopped nearby a row of chairs, typing a message to Edelgard first and another one to Manuela, letting her adoptive mother know she had made it sound and safe, before locking the screen and looking up.

There was a woman, a _gorgeous_ woman, grabbing her necklace as she looked at her.

Green eyes as clear as a water mirror looked at her.

Ingrid blinked, in her knees, just her broken lance keeping her torso up. Felix had fallen next to her, Sylvain greeting him in the huge hall for the fallen warriors, she hoped.

She closed her eyes, breathing heavily, not looking up, not seeing the black boots that came to her, the sword lurking over her head, the last judgment she’d receive in life. She didn’t see any of it. She didn’t feel any of it.

Her eyes closed, her mind wandering far away, her wounds a breathing creature that took away the last of her life in a gentle rocking.

In a gentle rocking, the wooden floor of the drakkar, sailing through the shallow waters in the fjord back at home, the creaking sounds of the wood as the boat rocked slightly. The wind from the mountains ruffling her hair.

The green forests that guarded her family home, as green as Dorothea’s eyes the first time she’d seen them.

She wished to see them once more if she was worthy to be by Odin’s side or Frejya’s side. She wished to see those green forests once more.

Those green eyes once more.

The green that was her home.

The green eyes that looked at her perplexed.

Dorothea opened her mouth, gasping for a second, a step back as the woman clenched her fist tightly and then let go of it, revealing a necklace from where a silver Mjölnir hung. Something awoke in her, deep, ancient, powerful, strange.

And yet familiar.

She blinked a couple of times, before composing herself and smiling, a reassuring smile. The other woman blushed profusely and bowed as she greeted her in that strange tongue she didn’t speak. Dorothea laughed and walked up to her, stretching out her hand in a wordless greeting.

The blonde woman, red cheeks, strong shoulders, a long, defined neck, took her hand and shook it in a firm yet gentle grip.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to look, I just.. I feel like I know you from somewhere.” She said, speaking slowly enough to make sure she wasn’t rushing through words that were not familiar to the blonde that still held her hand. Her smile relaxed a bit, blossoming into something beyond beautiful.

Something that tugged her heart and sent electric waves through her body.

“I must apologize as well, it was rude of me…”

“Well, I think I can forgive you if you invite me something… what about coffee? Unless you’re about to catch a plane.” Dorothea asked, her brows waggling without her permission.

“No, I was giving some friends a ride, they were leaving for their honeymoon, those idiots… I… I’d love to invite you to a cup of coffee…” She looked at her, letting go of her hand, leaving behind the trace of her warmth and the stinging feeling of loss.

“Dorothea. I’m Dorothea Arnault, a pleasure.” She said, grabbing her suitcase and looking at the woman in a meaningful way. The blonde seemed to snap out of a dream, straightening up and clearing her throat. She’d been lost looking at her eyes and lips, Dorothea had noticed.

“Uh, of course, let me lead the way…” She motioned for them to start walking, her green flannel shirt and her jeans were simple and yet attractive to her eyes. “I’m Ingrid.”

“Ingrid…” The name had a ring to it she loved. Dorothea smiled, following Ingrid amid the people that ran or cruised in the building. “Ingrid… it’s a beautiful name.”

“Thank you, uh, Dorothea is beautiful, too…”

Dorothea had to laugh as to how lost the girl was with her, it was endearing and silly.

It felt right.

With a wink, not knowing she’d do it so many more times in the future, she smiled at her and just said “I think I already like you, Ingrid.”

Ingrid smiled and kicked a chair since she had eyes only for Dorothea.

The songstress laughed again as the girl mumbled an apology.

Ingrid.

Such a beautiful name.

Such a handsome woman.

She didn’t lie, she liked her already.

And with time it wouldn’t be only Ingrid.

It’d be her Ingrid.

_Her Ingrid._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't thank enough all my amazing fellow writers that were there to help me finish this one, you all ROCK!
> 
> I hope you liked this little story, my first Dorogrid (I love Ingrid, maybe a bit too much...), it was really fun to write.
> 
> Have a great day!

**Author's Note:**

> I have the great honor and joy to be a part of the Fódlan Olympics project! So many talented writers have gathered to deliver a wonderful piece of work and I'm just ecstatic to be a part of it! You can follow the project through the twitter account: @Fodlan_Olympics
> 
> I'll be participating in the Edeleth Big Bang project as well (and it's so amazing, you can find the twitter for that here @BbEdeleth), I'm actually beyond thrilled for all these events going on! But it also means that I may be late for my usual updates, bear with me as something amazing is being created with so many talented people!
> 
> You can also find me around in twitter @KuroKR_
> 
> Have a great day!


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